This invention relates generally to the field of furniture, and more particularly to a novel furniture system in which articles of furniture which, though in a range of diverse forms and designs, are each constituted by a basic, multi-section structural module that when erected, acts to define the vertical side panels of the piece, the panels being bridgeable by removable shelves, tops and other horizontal components in a manner depending on the predetermined form and design of the piece.
In traditional techniques for fabricating furniture articles such as desks, tables or work stations, the side panels, legs, tops and all other components thereof are permanently joined together at the factory to create a three-dimensional rigid structure. In order, therefore, to box a traditional piece of furniture for handling, storage and shipment, the carton or crate for this purpose must be dimensioned to fully enclose the piece. And to further protect the piece, interior padding, cushioning and other expedients are required.
Thus the selling price to the purchaser of household, office or industrial furniture is predicted not only on materials and production costs, but also necessarily takes into account crating, handling and shipping expenses. The volume occupied by a three-dimensional piece of furniture, even one consisting simply of a rectangular table top and four thin legs, is usually substantial. Since shipping charges are generally based on volume as well as weight, a large piece of conventionally produced furniture may cost almost as much to crate and ship as it does to manufacture.
Moreover, when a crated article of furniture is received at its ultimate destination, it must be uncrated, care being exercised not to damage the piece in the process of doing so. This is a time-consuming procedure, further complicated by the fact that the customer also has to dispose of the dismantled crate or carton.
Because of the many problems involved in handling and shipping conventionally-produced articles of furniture, the trend in recent years has been toward knock-down or modular furniture constructions. Such furniture can be mass-produced in component form and boxed and shipped in a flat disassembled state, thereby effecting significant economies in storage, shipping and handling costs. Pieces of this type are designed for ready assembly at their ultimate destination by means of bolts, bracket, braces and other connecting and reinforcing elements.
But the advantages of knock-down or modular furniture is more or less offset by the fact that when assembled, such pieces often present an unattractive or unfinished appearance by reason of exposed bolts and other connecting hardware. Furthermore, the resultant structure may lack the strength and stability of conventional pieces of similar form made with permanently-bonded joints. Also, with knock-down furniture of the type heretofore known, the hardware therefor must be carefully inventoried. Should a purchaser receive wrong hardware or an inadequate amount of connectors, the article cannot be properly assembled. And because of the many different types of hardware usually entailed in assembling a typical knock-down piece of furniture, assembly procedures are complicated and it is difficult to keep track of hardware.
Also of growing concern in the field of furniture design is the increasing scarcity of high quality lumber and the rising cost of such material. To reduce furniture cost and yet provide attractive furniture articles, it is sometimes the practice to make these of relatively inexpensive unfinished wood core panels having fabric or plastic facings laminated thereto, thereby concealing core defects. But furniture pieces made with laminated panels of this type do not readily lend themselves to knock-down and modular design.
Another factor that must be considered, particularly in office furniture design, is versatility and flexibility. In modern corporate life, changes are frequently made in production, marketing and accounting strategies to cope with new situations. The need therefore often arises at corporate facilities to rearrange the existing set-up of work stations, desks, room dividers and all other appurtenances of the facility in a new configuration that is conducive to expediting the newly-adopted plan. Also, in some instances it may be necessary to transfer these appurtenances from one corporate site to another.
Traditional office furniture systems are ill adapted for this purpose, for they are inherently inflexible. For example, is a decision is made at corporate headquarters to shift the entire accounting department from the third floor to the fifth floor presently occupied by the engineering department, and to move the latter department to another building, with traditional furniture systems this changeover represents a formidable task that is difficult to carry out in short order, however urgent the need to do so with a minimum of dislocation and loss of time.